WEBVTT - Way Black History Fact - Accounts of White Slavers Kidnapping Africans

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<v Speaker 1>Right now, it's time for our way Black History Fact.

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<v Speaker 1>In today's way Black History Fact is sponsored by Major Threads.

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<v Speaker 1>For innovative, fashionable sportswear, check major threads dot com. We're

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<v Speaker 1>going to talk about the other ways white slavers obtained

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<v Speaker 1>African slaves. I'm going to share a bit from Liverpool

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<v Speaker 1>Museums dot org dot UK. Normally this is something we

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<v Speaker 1>use from United States based stuff, but you know, we're

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<v Speaker 1>not comfortable with our own history. So and the second

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<v Speaker 1>part of the show, of course, we're going to talk

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<v Speaker 1>about other ways that America happened upon slaves. Anyway, the

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<v Speaker 1>peoples of West Africa had a rich and varied history

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<v Speaker 1>and culture long before European slavers arrived. They had a

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<v Speaker 1>wide variety of political arrangements, including kingdoms, city states, and

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<v Speaker 1>other organizations, each with their own languages and culture. The

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<v Speaker 1>Empire of Songhai and the kingdoms of Mali, Beanin and

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<v Speaker 1>Congo were large and powerful, with monarchs having complex political

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<v Speaker 1>structures governing hundreds of thousands of subjects and other areas.

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<v Speaker 1>Political systems were smaller and weaker, relying on agreements between

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<v Speaker 1>people at village level, as in the sixteenth century War

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<v Speaker 1>torn Europe, the balance of power between political states and

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<v Speaker 1>groups was constantly changing. Art learning and technology flourished, and

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<v Speaker 1>Africans were especially skilled in subjects like medicine, mathematics, and astronomy,

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<v Speaker 1>as well as domestic goods. They made fine luxury items

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<v Speaker 1>in bronze, ivory, gold, and terra cotta for both local

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<v Speaker 1>use and trade. West Africans had traded with Europeans through

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<v Speaker 1>merchants in North Africa for centuries. The first traders to

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<v Speaker 1>sail down the West African coast were the Portuguese in

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<v Speaker 1>the fifteenth century. Later the Dutch, British, French, and Scandinavians followed.

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<v Speaker 1>They were mainly interested in precious items such as gold, ivory,

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<v Speaker 1>and spices, particularly pepper. From the first contract's, European traders

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<v Speaker 1>kidnapped and brought Africans for sale in Europe. However, it

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<v Speaker 1>was not until the seventeenth century, when plantation owners wanted

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<v Speaker 1>more and more slaves to satisfy the increasing demand for

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<v Speaker 1>sugar in Europe, that transatlantic slaving became the dominant trade.

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<v Speaker 1>European traders captured some Africans in raids along the coast,

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<v Speaker 1>but bought most of them from the local African or

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<v Speaker 1>African European dealers. These dealers had a sophisticated network of

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<v Speaker 1>trading alliances, collecting groups of people together for trade. Most

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<v Speaker 1>of the Africans who were captured were enslaves, sorry were

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<v Speaker 1>captured in battles or were kidnapped, though some were sold

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<v Speaker 1>into slavery for debt and its punishment. The captives were

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<v Speaker 1>marched to the coast often and during long journeys of

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<v Speaker 1>weeks or even months, shackled to one another. At the coast,

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<v Speaker 1>they were imprisoned in large stone forts built by European

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<v Speaker 1>trading companies or in smaller wooden compounds. All right, now,

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<v Speaker 1>I'm going to share a bit from the New York

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<v Speaker 1>Times magazine discussing piracy is not all slaves were bought. Okay.

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<v Speaker 1>Sometime in sixteen nineteen, a Portuguese slave ship, the Sao

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<v Speaker 1>Jowl Bautista, traveled across the Atlantic Ocean with a hole

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<v Speaker 1>filled with human cargo, captive Africans from Angola in southwestern Africa,

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<v Speaker 1>the men, women and children, most likely from the kingdoms

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<v Speaker 1>of Nyongo and Congo, and the horrific journey bound for

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<v Speaker 1>a life of enslavement in Mexico. Almost half the captives

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<v Speaker 1>had died by the time the ship was seized by

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<v Speaker 1>two English pirate ships. The remaining Africans were taken to

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<v Speaker 1>Point Comfort, a point near Jamestown, the capital of the

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<v Speaker 1>English Colony of Virginia, which the Virginia Company of London

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<v Speaker 1>had established twelve years earlier. The colonist John Rolfe wrote

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<v Speaker 1>to Sir Edwin Sandy's of the Virginia Company that in

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<v Speaker 1>August sixteen nineteen a dutch Man of war had arrived

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<v Speaker 1>in the colony and brought not anything but twenty and

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<v Speaker 1>an odd negros, which the governor and Cape merchant bought

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<v Speaker 1>for virtuals. The Africans were most likely put to work

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<v Speaker 1>in tobacco fields that had recently been established in the area.

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<v Speaker 1>So for folks that are not able to stick around

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<v Speaker 1>for the second part of the show, you know, we

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<v Speaker 1>just want you to know that not all slaves were

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<v Speaker 1>bought and sold by Africans into slavery, although there is

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<v Speaker 1>a whole conversation that we have had and will continue

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<v Speaker 1>to have about that many slaves work indeed kidnapped from

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<v Speaker 1>Africa using piracy and other means.